


agree to duel

by dude_dude_dude



Category: South Park RPF
Genre: Alcohol, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Face Slapping, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Kink Discovery, M/M, Masturbation, Self Confidence Issues, Suicidal Thoughts, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-19
Updated: 2020-02-19
Packaged: 2021-02-28 02:42:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22686442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dude_dude_dude/pseuds/dude_dude_dude
Summary: While Trey was often a pacing, irritable fuck when he hated an episode, he was never this bad.
Relationships: Trey Parker/Matt Stone
Kudos: 27





	agree to duel

**Author's Note:**

> _“Every show, I’m like, this is a horrible show, I don’t want anyone to see it. There was one episode we did ... and I’m like: I’ve lost it. I just went home and I was depressed and I couldn’t sleep. I literally wanted to kill myself over that episode. It’s crazy.”_ \- Trey Parker [[X](https://youtu.be/mzJXuwzaZoc?t=630)]
> 
> This fic exists because I love cute guys named Trey Parker suffering <3 The title is from the episode Trey lost it over: _Make Love Not Warcraft_.

“Oh no. No, no, no.” Matt grabbed Trey’s wrist, wrestling the bottle-opener from his hand as he took it from the kitchen drawer. “You’ve had enough.” 

Trey hadn’t said much in the last difficult hours since they’d returned from the studio. Another frustrated grunt was his response to Matt gently pushing him away from the open drawer where an array of sharp, shiny kitchen knives glistened enticingly under the strip lights. 

“Come on,” Matt pushed. “Why don’t you have a bath or something?” 

He was relieved when Trey shook his head miserably, because it only dawned on him after he’d suggested a bath that Trey might try and drown himself in it. However many times he’d threatened to kill himself since they’d dropped the final tape to the network, Matt never thought he’d actually do it, but Trey’s track record meant he never trusted these deep, dark moods of his. The last time he’d gotten exasperated enough to leave him when he was like this—and only for a walk—Trey had gotten so drunk and high he’d almost done a Jimi Hendrix on their couch. 

Managing to get Trey to abandon the idea of more drinking felt like a win: Matt one, Trey zero. Watching him sink to the floor, back against the kitchen cupboards and legs flopping out in front of him . . . well, nobody won there. Matt only felt sorry for him. He looked utterly hopeless, like he was staying in one piece because he couldn’t will his body to break apart simply because he wanted it to.

Matt squatted beside him and stroked the back of his neck. The episode would be airing now, and that knowledge pulled at his guts. “What’s the worst that could happen?” 

Trey scoffed, the movement jerking his flaccid, hunched form. Again, he said nothing. 

The most frustrating thing about this was the episode wasn’t terrible. Matt had barely slept in the last two days, because he knew if he left Trey alone for a second he’d scrap the episode and attempt the near-impossible task of scripting, animating, voicing and editing an episode together in less than 48 hours. He’d done it before, just, but it almost killed him, and Matt was so sure the animators hated them he’d sent them gigantic, expensive hampers (straight to their homes—Trey had no idea) in thanks for slugging through on espresso and ten-minute cat naps under their desks. 

While Trey was often a pacing, irritable fuck when he hated an episode, he was never this bad. He’d sat sobbing at his desk for twenty minutes before Matt managed to coax him into the sound booth for the final scenes. Trey had stopped eating too, which was a red flag bigger than the Soviet Union’s. It took Matt threatening to force-feed him to get something down him. That was about eighteen hours ago now, and probably the main contributing factor to Trey’s current trembling. 

“Want me to make you a sandwich?” Matt asked, knowing he’d get no answer. 

If Trey wasn’t such a fat fuck, he’d carry him to the couch. At least it’d be a more comfortable place to wish for death. If Matt didn’t care for him so much, he’d tell him he was overreacting, being a Streisand-level drama queen, an infuriating dickwad, and give him some of that tough love Trey enjoyed dishing out when the shoe was on the other foot. 

Unable to think of anything that might pull him out of this, Matt kissed the top of his head and left him on the kitchen floor. He opened a window, checked his phone, went for a piss, and as he was washing his hands, noticed a strange thudding coming from the kitchen. 

“For fuck sake,” Matt mumbled, wiping his wet hands on his pants.

Trey was bashing the back of his head against the cupboard, not even wincing. Putting his hand behind his head, Matt held his hair and steadied him. He was worse than a baby sometimes. 

“Will you get up off the fucking floor?”

“What difference’ll that make?” Trey asked. Hearing him speak in a complete sentence after such lengthy silence was mildly shocking. His voice sounded like shit.

“You won’t be on the floor, for one,” Matt said, tugging his arm. 

To his surprise, Trey got up without much fuss. Once on his feet, he stood there staring at his socks, which wasn’t much of an improvement. The expression on his face was so sullen he’d have fitted in well at a funeral if he wasn’t dressed like a bum. He’d been wearing the same t-shirt since Saturday, and you could track everything he’d eaten since then by the stains on it. 

“Come and sit down,” Matt encouraged, hoping Trey would follow as he strode into the living room. 

Before Matt’s ass hit the couch, Trey had stuck his head, shoulders and half his chest through the window and was almost out on the fire escape before Matt grabbed his shirt.

“Get off me!” Trey struggled, clawing at the window frame. Sticking his head through it again, he yelled into the L.A. night: “I’m a fucking failure!” His only reply was traffic, so he added, “Who else is a fucking failure?” raising an eyebrow when someone ten stories below answered with an enthusiastic _hell yeah_. 

“Well done,” Matt said, peeling Trey’s fingers from the window before he closed it. “You’ve managed to find a loser in L.A. That’s about as difficult as finding a tourist on Hollywood Boulevard.” 

By the time he turned around, Trey was gone. The sound of the medicine cabinet opening in the bathroom had him speeding in there to pull his friend away from another tempting way of ending it all. Trey slumped onto the lip of the bath and started crying again, and all Matt could do was stand there and let him fall against his stomach. 

“I don’t wanna be awake,” Trey whimpered, gripping Matt’s waist. 

“Then go to bed.” He stroked the back of Trey’s head gently, hoping the touch would soothe him.

Voice muffled in Matt’s belly, Trey said: “I can’t sleep.”

“You haven’t tried.” 

“How can I sleep when everything’s fucked?” 

“You don’t know that.”

“I do!” Trey looked up at him sharply, pulling out of his embrace. “For fuck sake! You know it’s the worst episode we’ve ever made, you _know_ that! Don’t you give a fuck?”

Looking him straight in the eye, Matt shrugged. “No, not really.” 

Trey was a perfectionist to the nth degree, and he cared way too much about what people thought of him and his work. He’d never admit the latter, of course, though sometimes he made it painfully obvious by being too weighted on the side of false arrogance that anyone with basic social skills could see the imbalance a mile away, but even if he had made a really, really bad episode—which he hadn’t—it wouldn’t matter in the long run. They weren’t even at the end of the season yet. Comedy Central wouldn’t pull the plug on them that fast. They couldn’t.

Offended by Matt’s detachment, Trey stomped through to the bedroom, mumbling under his breath. At least anger was better than despair. Perhaps making Trey angry was a good idea. Ransacking the place meant he wasn’t beating himself up. It might tire him out enough to sleep, too.

By the time Matt was in the bedroom doorway, it was obvious that Trey’s brief flash of anger was one of his ever-changing moods. He was back to slumping, this time on the edge of the bed, face in his hands. The clock on the nightstand read 10:17. The episode would be halfway through by now. 

“I can’t cope with this,” Trey mumbled. “I can’t.” He’d started hyperventilating, so Matt kept his distance. It was hard to gauge what to do when Trey got himself into a state like this one—kind of like a panic attack but gloomier, more self-loathing. 

Matt started when Trey jerked his head up and stared at him like he’d been possessed by someone with more energy. “Knock me out!” he said with a gasp, as if it was the best idea he’d ever had. 

“What?”

Trey pointed to his temple. “Hit me, right here. I’ll be out like a light.”

“Uh, no?” 

“Please,” Trey begged, lips trembling. He blinked a tear down his cheek and reached pathetically towards him. “Please, Matt.” 

Walking over was not an assent, though Trey’s eyes lit up like it was. “I’m not fucking hitting you,” Matt assured him, standing in front of him. “Ever. So knock that shit off right now.” 

He didn’t think he’d ever seen Trey’s face contort in such discomfort before. His eyes were bloodshot, and the pitiful sob he made, like a gurgle in the back of his throat, had Matt reaching out to hold his cheek. Trey didn’t recoil, which was good, but he stared up at him as he thumbed his cheekbone, mouthing a despairing “please.”

“No,” Matt whispered, shaking his head slowly. 

Trey swallowed, leaning into Matt’s hand. With what Matt knew was complete honesty, he said, “I’m gonna do something stupid.” 

“No, you’re not.” Not while he was here. 

With his head tipped at this angle, Trey’s tears slipped down over Matt’s hand as he continued stroking his face. It seemed to calm him, until he pulled away from his grip with a shaky, unstable energy. 

“I don’t trust myself!”

“Then trust me.” 

Trey glanced at the clock and sniffled, looking down at his lap sharply. He shook his head. “I need to be unconscious for a while. You get me, right?”

Matt sighed, and not impatiently. “I get you.” He knelt, holding Trey’s face again. Leaning in close, he pressed his lips to his tearstained cheek and asked, “What can I distract you with?” He’d suggest going somewhere fancy for dinner if he wasn’t convinced Trey would puke up anything he managed to swallow. Watching a movie, maybe? But keeping Trey’s interest was near impossible when he was in one of these ghastly lows. 

“Fuck me,” Trey said out of nowhere, and Matt almost swallowed his tongue. 

“Uh.” 

“Fuck me so hard I can’t think straight.”

Matt regained his composure. “I hate to break it to you, but you’re not exactly . . .” He gave Trey’s dirty t-shirt an obvious once over. “. . . doing it for me right now.” 

“I need some pain.” 

Matt gathered that. Pain was the last refuge of a desperate man, and it didn’t have to be physical in Trey’s case. Trey had behaved appallingly in the past to punish himself, a kind of self-flagellation in the form of throwing his money away in strip joints, taking so much coke he’d ended up in ER getting stitches in his shoulder, and handing in his resignation only for Matt to swoop in and say it was all a big Trey-Parker-shaped practical joke. 

This evening, Trey’s pain took of the form of locking himself away in that big mind of his, beating himself up until his brain was a deflated punchbag with all its stuffing hanging out. But it wasn’t enough. 

“Shh.” Matt pulled Trey’s face into his chest and cradled him. “I promise it’ll look better in the morning.” When Trey shook his head under his hands, Matt added, “It will. You know it will.” It always did. “You need some sleep.” They both did.

“Hit me,” Trey mumbled, and for fuck sake, he still wasn’t giving up on that one, was he? 

Matt ignored him. 

“If you don’t . . .” The threat hung in the air.

“Don’t be a douchebag,” Matt said, still stroking his hair. 

“I’m begging you.” Trey pressed his nose into his cheek. “Just once.” If he was trying to wind him up, it was working. “Or are you too much of a pussy?” 

Resisting him would be difficult, because once Trey set his mind on something, he stuck at it until he got his own way. Matt wouldn’t even entertain the idea of hitting him though. It was ludicrous. If Trey hadn’t had so many beers, he’d think the same.

Trey shoved him hard, forcing him to steady himself on the nightstand. 

“What the fuck!”

“If you don’t hit me,” Trey hissed, “I’ll hit you.” He raised an eyebrow at Matt in challenge, clenching his fist on his lap. He was acting like a fucking dick, but at least this non-argument was distracting him. 

Still holding the nightstand, Matt asked, “What exactly will hitting you accomplish, apart from breaking my fucking hand?” Asking the question was not him acquiescing, but Trey might think it was, and the more they talked about this the longer they weren’t talking about _South Park_ and Trey’s bleak future working in McDonald’s as a failed, bankrupt, universally hated ex-TV writer.

“Do it and find out.” 

Matt rolled his eyes and went to get to his feet. Halfway up from the floor, Trey grabbed his wrist way too hard and crossed the asshole line. Matt knew he was playing right into Trey’s hands, but in a flash of bitterness that was part 'I’m doing this to get you to shut the fuck up' and part 'I’m doing this to show you that not all your ideas are good ones', Matt slapped him across his cheek and sent him flying. 

The guilt made his stomach drop, all his blood rushing from what was clearly his cold, dead heart, (because what kind of friend did that?) and twisting down into his guts. Trey’s whimper of pain was the worst sound he’d ever heard, and while he wasn’t as prone to overacting as Trey was, Matt was certain that this was it: partnership over.

“Fuck,” Trey breathed, holding his cheek as he turned to stare up at Matt with wide, watery eyes. He drew a sharp breath, exhaling a positively erotic sound as his mouth hung open. 

“God, I’m sorry,” Matt said, stunned. 

In disbelief, Trey said shakily, “I didn’t think you’d actually do it.” A smile flashed across his lips. 

“Well.” Matt cleared his throat. “If you’re done sulking . . .” He wanted to walk away, stop himself falling to his knees and apologising until the sun came up, but he couldn’t look away from Trey’s expression. He looked . . . Fuck, he looked positively debauched. Scandalised, and in the best way. 

Glancing at the crotch of his jeans—which to Matt’s horror and fascination was filling out fast with an unmistakable erection—Trey turned his eyes up to Matt again. “I didn’t think that’d happen either.”

“Did it hurt?” Matt asked, curious as hell. 

Trey nodded, still holding his cheek, mouth hanging open as he tongued along the inside of his lower lip. 

“And you like that?” To be fair to him, he’d always been a kinky little shit. 

“Apparently.” The fresh weight in Trey’s eyelids was all arousal, not part of the exhaustion and depression that’d made him a zombie since he knew, or thought he knew, that his career was ruined. 

“Lemme see,” Matt said, peeling Trey’s hand from his face. 

He studied the redness on his cheek, a clear line of swollen skin slashing his cheekbone where his palm struck. Too curious not to, he brushed his fingers over the hot mark; Trey hissed through his teeth, closing his eyes as they rolled back. He’d seen that expression before, Trey’s complete trust handed over as he fucked him on his back, hips slamming between spread thighs, weak and vulnerable and loving it. 

As Matt traced the edge of the mark, Trey rubbed his dick with the heel of his palm and opened his eyes to gaze at the new object of his focus. 

“What’s it look like?” Trey asked, biting his lip, still casually stroking himself through his jeans. 

“Like you got bitch-slapped,” Matt said, voice as steady as he could make it. Hitting him hadn’t felt good, but the aftermath really, really did. The way Trey was looking at him right now was enough to give him whiplash—suicidal to horny in 0.5 seconds—but worst of all, it was getting him hard. 

Through slow, heavy breaths, Trey dared, “Do it again.” 

This was not how Matt thought this evening would go down. Knowing Trey, it could easily turn back on itself, but for now, this was holding Trey’s attention, so he’d keep this up as long as he could without hurting him. 

“I will, when I’ve had my fill of this,” Matt whispered. He drew his fingernails along Trey’s glowing cheek, gentle, but not gentle enough to stop thin white lines trailing through pink, stubbled skin. 

Trey shuddered, eyelids falling closed as he mouthed a long _yeah_ and squeezed his dick. 

“Same cheek?” Matt asked, giving the fading mark a tap with his fingertips. 

Trey nodded, tilting his face into his hand, chasing the touch. He unzipped himself, slipping his dick through the vent in his boxers to take himself in his fist. Matt had a tiny suspicion Trey was faking how much he was enjoying this to get more of the mild pain a slap provided, but the size of his dick proved otherwise. It was a whole handful, enough to have Matt’s interest, and if Trey had showered any time recently, he’d probably be on his knees sucking it by now. 

“Do it,” Trey urged, looking up at him with those puppy-dog eyes that always managed to creep under Matt’s skin. 

In a strict tone Trey would enjoy, Matt snapped, “When I’m ready.” 

Trey’s breath hitched. “What’re you waiting for?” 

“I told you. I’m making the most of you looking this desperate.” 

Trey pouted. “Cruel.”

Smiling down at him, Matt told him to close his eyes. Trey obeyed, lips parting as he no doubt fantasised about getting another belt across the face. “You want it?” 

Trey nodded. 

Taking hold of his chin, Matt positioned Trey’s face and stepped back to size him up. Trey cracked an eye open and looked up at him, whimpering in anticipation. 

Matt stroked his temple. “Close your eyes.” He didn’t want Trey to see where his hand was coming from—the opposite side to the cheek they’d agreed on—and knew the longer he drew this out, the more obsessed Trey would get with it. Trey closed his eyes and squeezed his dick in his fist, breathing loud through his nose in anticipation. 

It took Matt a bit of mental pumping up to get himself to do it, because hurting Trey, even when he wanted it, was entirely against his nature. They’d play fought in the past. He’d bitten Trey’s shoulders pretty hard while fucking him over kitchen counters, the backs of couches, and Trey’s desk in the office. He’d never intentionally hit him. Though, he’d probably never need to do this again, so he might as well do it well while he had the opportunity. 

Pulling his hand back, he slapped Trey’s other cheek hard enough that the stinging snap of skin on skin rung out in the silence. Trey’s sob of pleasure was straight out of a porno, but Matt went from horny to anxious in the time it took Trey to open his eyes again, a big fat tear sliding down his cheek as he looked up at him in captivated shock. 

Trey’s dick throbbed in his frozen hand, come spilling over the backs of his knuckles as he stared at Matt in blissful incredulity, eyebrows raising before he almost bent double. He collapsed onto his back, panting, gulping, wincing through the pain. His messy fist slumping against the clean sheet made Matt wince too, so he grabbed some tissues from the nightstand and cleaned him up. 

“Better?” he asked, gently wiping his shrinking dick before he tucked it back inside his boxers. 

Nodding quietly, Trey mumbled, “Tired.” 

Matt pulled off Trey’s jeans and lifted his legs, encouraging him onto his side. Trey had never minded being manhandled, and he didn’t now. He settled his head on the pillow looking exhausted but calm, which was a miracle given how fifteen minutes ago he’d asked Matt to knock him out in all seriousness. Given the heat of the room, Matt left him uncovered. As he turned off the light, he told him he’d be next door if he needed him, though knowing Trey, he’d be asleep before he got through the door. 

Forgetting the sexy-as-fuck look on Trey’s face after he’d been hit wasn’t going to be easy. Matt didn’t think he could bother trying after the day (or days) he’d had. 

Waddling through to the bathroom, hard as a rock, he freed himself before the toilet. Jacking himself off gracelessly, he imagined Trey on all fours, warm lips glistening wet and sliding down his dick as Matt stood at the foot of the bed. His cheek was red from Matt’s palm, his pretty eyelashes wet from that or from choking on Matt’s dick; it didn’t really matter which. 

Hand working fast, Matt mentally pulled Trey off him by his hair, pushed him back and pinned his wrists down as he drove into his slick, readied asshole. It’d been a while since they’d fucked like that, and the thought had Matt’s breath hitching, his hand pumping faster. 

As his come hit the porcelain, he mentally filled Trey up, gritting his teeth at the way he moaned in his imagination. 

Somehow, rubbing one out in the bathroom made him feel guiltier than he had when he’d slapped Trey in the face that first, unexpected time. It was a similar kind of guilt to that he felt when he made out with chicks in nightclubs, aware Trey was within eyeshot. It was a weird shame, of being intimate with anyone but each other, which was stupid and they both knew that, but they still felt it. 

He sat on the couch, staring at his warped reflection in the TV’s black mirror for he didn’t know how long. The DVD player’s clock read 11:05. People would already be voicing their opinions of _Make Love Not Warcraft_ on the forums. In a weird moment of anxiety, Matt didn’t want to look, because what if Trey was right? What if people hated it? And what if the ratings email from HQ came through and confirmed almost every viewer had switched off before the first ad break?

Like the fretting angel on his shoulder had just materialised, Trey’s frail voice came through the crack in the door. “Please don’t look.”

“Look at what?” Matt called back, wondering if Trey was about to run through the living room naked or something. 

“The ratings.” He shuffled through in his socks and dirty t-shirt and flopped beside him, head resting in Matt’s lap. “I couldn’t sleep.” 

Matt didn’t say anything. He brushed his fingers through Trey’s thinning hair, soothing his own nerves along with Trey’s as he tried not to think about what tomorrow might bring. The motion of his hand made his eyelids heavy, the pull of sleep he desperately needed almost too tempting. If only he knew Trey was going to survive the night.

“Have you calmed down now?” he asked, still stroking Trey’s scalp. 

“Yeah.” He nudged Matt’s thigh with his cheek. “Sorry.” 

“S’okay.” And it was. It really was. 

He was about to suggest they check the laptop, because maybe they’d sleep better knowing if the response was good or bad, but Trey’s soft snoring cut him off. Matt was still idly stroking his hair on autopilot, and Trey’s face looked free of all the stress of the last week while he dozed on his lap, utterly content. 

Matt smiled and sank back into the couch. This wasn’t the ideal place or position to sleep, but he’d be stuck with it until Trey woke up, so he might as well use the time wisely. After all, they’d be back at the studio soon, and the cycle would start all over again.


End file.
